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Spring Training Game thread

Tribe 11, Reds 10

Pitching, as would be expected this early in Spring Training, is behind the hitting. However, the Tribe managed to get a walk-off win against the Reds in their Spring Training opener today. The Tribe managed to score 7 runs in the first 3 innings (when most of the starters were in the game). The only pitchers that are expected to make the Opening Day roster were Vinnie Pestano (1 scoreless inning) and Frank Herrmann (1 scoreless inning)...Rich Hill also went a scoreless frame, which could be good for the pen if they have another left-handed option. Raburn and Chisenhall went yard...Swisher had a hit, Brantley went 2-2 with 2 doubles, Santana went 2-2, and bench candidate Mike McDade hit the walk off 3 run double to win the game.

Encouraging start to the season...looking forward to finding out what the starters that we are counting on will do in their debuts and going forward.

very encouraging start. god i cant wait til april 2nd.. plus i expect rich hill to make the team in the pen. he had a good yr last yr, albeit short coming back from tommy john. hes pitched well out the pen last few yrs. another great thing is francona has been veryyyy impressed with scott kazmir. god that would be great if he came close to returning to form

The start of something great to come in Carolina, bring on the haters!

won again today, and how about ryan raburn and michael brantley so far? brantley 4-4 with 3 doubles.. raburn in 4ab's is 3-3 with 3hr and 5rbi, 1bb.. personally i think he is almost a sure bet for a bench job.. think our bench will be aviles, raburn, giambi, marson.. swisher can be our 4th OF'er, and also raburn/aviles can play in the corner OF spots also.. as for our pen, my projection goes: Perez, Pestano, Smith, Shaw, Allen, Capps, Rich Hill.. i think the odd man out will be matt albers and nick hagadone is probably deserving and they could possibly go with him over allen or capps to have a 2nd lefty, but our pen is so deep he may be an odd man out because off having options left...

my wildcard prediction... I think scott kazmir will win the #5 starter job.. and id love for this to happen. 2 spring training games in, im way ahead of myself but i cant help it! im ready for opening day!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The start of something great to come in Carolina, bring on the haters!

won again today, and how about ryan raburn and michael brantley so far? brantley 4-4 with 3 doubles.. raburn in 4ab's is 3-3 with 3hr and 5rbi, 1bb.. personally i think he is almost a sure bet for a bench job.. think our bench will be aviles, raburn, giambi, marson.. swisher can be our 4th OF'er, and also raburn/aviles can play in the corner OF spots also.. as for our pen, my projection goes: Perez, Pestano, Smith, Shaw, Allen, Capps, Rich Hill.. i think the odd man out will be matt albers and nick hagadone is probably deserving and they could possibly go with him over allen or capps to have a 2nd lefty, but our pen is so deep he may be an odd man out because off having options left...

my wildcard prediction... I think scott kazmir will win the #5 starter job.. and id love for this to happen. 2 spring training games in, im way ahead of myself but i cant help it! im ready for opening day!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Brantley hitting third? What the hell? I'd MUCH rather have Swisher or Kipnis hitting third. Brantley should be near the bottom.

personally id love having brantley hit 3rd. hitting in font of swisher it will give him plenty of pitches to hit, and he doesnt K much which is another good sign and michael brantley just plays pepper with the gaps. yeah he may not have the power of your typical middle of the order hitter but he can hit with guys on base. i don't think he'll be hitting 3rd, but i almost certainly think he will be in the 5 spot. dude started spring 3-4 with 3 rbi doubles? brantley is going to have a BREAKOUT season this yr. im callin 15hrs, 40 doubles, 80+rbi's and swiping 20 bases.. all while hitting .300

The start of something great to come in Carolina, bring on the haters!

personally id love having brantley hit 3rd. hitting in font of swisher it will give him plenty of pitches to hit, and he doesnt K much which is another good sign and michael brantley just plays pepper with the gaps. yeah he may not have the power of your typical middle of the order hitter but he can hit with guys on base. i don't think he'll be hitting 3rd, but i almost certainly think he will be in the 5 spot. dude started spring 3-4 with 3 rbi doubles? brantley is going to have a BREAKOUT season this yr. im callin 15hrs, 40 doubles, 80+rbi's and swiping 20 bases.. all while hitting .300

Perhaps you should think about putting the bong down for a while.. break out huh?.. 20 what?.. more homers than he's accumulated in his entire ML career?.. etc etc.. How about he has a healthy season?.. or.. he plays 142 games?.. would that do it for you?

Brantley most definitely doesn't deserve to hit near the bottom of the order. Last year, he was one of (if not the) most consistent hitters on the team. He was doing that hitting without much around him. Now that he has Swisher and Reynolds to go along with Santana, Cabrera, and Kipnis...it isn't out of the question to see him hit .290+, double digit HRs, drive in 70+, 30-40 doubles, while walking 60+ times and only striking out roughly the same number of times. On most teams, that is either a #2 hitter or a 5-6 guy.

This line-up not only takes pressure of the young guys (Kipnis and Chisenhall) but also breaks up our lefty/righty hitters. Think about it...if Bourn can hit .290+, Brantley can hit .290+, Cabrera can hit .280+, there are going to be guys on ALL THE TIME for Swisher, Reynolds, Santana, and Kipnis...think of the RBI numbers that those guys could put up???

No matter what the order is going to be...it is nice as hell to have to worry about discussions like this rather than "Where are Austin Kearns and Shelley Duncan hitting in the line-up?"

Brantley most definitely doesn't deserve to hit near the bottom of the order. Last year, he was one of (if not the) most consistent hitters on the team. He was doing that hitting without much around him. Now that he has Swisher and Reynolds to go along with Santana, Cabrera, and Kipnis...it isn't out of the question to see him hit .290+, double digit HRs, drive in 70+, 30-40 doubles, while walking 60+ times and only striking out roughly the same number of times. On most teams, that is either a #2 hitter or a 5-6 guy.

This line-up not only takes pressure of the young guys (Kipnis and Chisenhall) but also breaks up our lefty/righty hitters. Think about it...if Bourn can hit .290+, Brantley can hit .290+, Cabrera can hit .280+, there are going to be guys on ALL THE TIME for Swisher, Reynolds, Santana, and Kipnis...think of the RBI numbers that those guys could put up???

No matter what the order is going to be...it is nice as hell to have to worry about discussions like this rather than "Where are Austin Kearns and Shelley Duncan hitting in the line-up?"

It's not a knock on Brantley that I'd put him near the bottom. It's just that we have some much better 1-2-3 guys than him. No reason he can't earn it throughout the season, I just wouldn't start him there. Put him near the bottom as a "second leadoff" type hitter.

I would rather split up the switch hitters, I think its a bad idea too have them all hitting right after each other like you have.

It just happens that the three switch hitters are (arguably) the 3 best hitters/run producers on the team. The only way to break that up is to maybe swap Reynolds and Santana, moving Santana to the 6 hole. Asdrubal has to be in the 2-6 range, Swisher has to be in the 3-5 range, and Santana has to be in the 4-6 range...not a whole lot of options in terms of breaking them up. As much as I would love to move Kipnis higher up in the order, he has to earn that spot...he hit .257 last year, we don't want that in the top 1/3 of our order unless it is .257 with 40 bombs and 110 RBI...you can live with that, but not when the .257 got us 14 HR and 76 RBI.

The only real lock with our batting order is Michael Bourn hitting leadoff...other than that, we have players that either have something to prove or are versatile enough to hit in multiple spots in the line-up. Chisenhall and Stubbs will, more than likely be in the 8-9 spots. From 2-7...a lot of questions remain to be answered.

This is just the order that I would turn in if I had the line-up card. Again...at least this is a conversation that we are having rather than the Cunningham, Kearns, Duncan, Lopez, O-Cabrera, Buck, Damon conversations of the past two years!

Brantley most definitely doesn't deserve to hit near the bottom of the order. Last year, he was one of (if not the) most consistent hitters on the team. He was doing that hitting without much around him. Now that he has Swisher and Reynolds to go along with Santana, Cabrera, and Kipnis...it isn't out of the question to see him hit .290+, double digit HRs, drive in 70+, 30-40 doubles, while walking 60+ times and only striking out roughly the same number of times. On most teams, that is either a #2 hitter or a 5-6 guy.

This line-up not only takes pressure of the young guys (Kipnis and Chisenhall) but also breaks up our lefty/righty hitters. Think about it...if Bourn can hit .290+, Brantley can hit .290+, Cabrera can hit .280+, there are going to be guys on ALL THE TIME for Swisher, Reynolds, Santana, and Kipnis...think of the RBI numbers that those guys could put up???

No matter what the order is going to be...it is nice as hell to have to worry about discussions like this rather than "Where are Austin Kearns and Shelley Duncan hitting in the line-up?"

this lineup wont happen because of the mere fact francona has publicly stated he doesnt want two leftys back to back.. so bourn, brantley aint happening.

The start of something great to come in Carolina, bring on the haters!

Apparently hitting home runs was as viral as the Harlem Shake in Scottsdale, Arizona on Tuesday as the Indians slugged their way to a 4-3 victory over the defending World Series champion San Francisco Giants. Both teams collected their share of runs via the long ball as Cleveland hitters clubbed three solo blasts while the Giants belted two of their own. Tribe bullpen hopeful Bryan Shaw walked away with the win while starting rotation candidate Daisuke Matsuzaka pitched three shutout innings.

Catching prospect Roberto Perez sealed the win for the Tribe with a solo shot to deep left field in the top of the ninth, putting them up 4-3, but shortstop Juan Diaz and first baseman Nick Swisher were already on record with home runs of their own in the fourth and fifth innings, respectively. Swisher’s homer marks his second of the spring bringing him up to a .500 average with seven RBI in exhibition play thus far.

Center fielder Ezequiel Carrera reached first base on a fielder’s choice ground out in the second inning, stole second and third base consecutively and scored on an RBI single off the bat of third baseman Luis Hernandez. Carrera, a utility outfielder candidate, now has five steals on the spring.

Indians submarine-style right-hander Joe Smith made his 2013 Cactus League debut Tuesday after being sidelined all of spring training up to this point with an abdominal strain. Smith did not receive a kindly greeting as Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford launched a two-run home run off of him in the fourth giving San Francisco a 3-2 lead at the time.

Expectations for right-handed starter Daisuke Matsuzaka aren’t very high in Cleveland, but he is making a decent case for himself as he pitched three shutout innings in his third Cactus League appearance with the Tribe. Matsuzaka did give up five hits in that span, however, while striking out two.

“This was the best I’ve felt out of my three outings.” Matsuzaka told the Plain Dealer’s Paul Hoynes.

The radar gun clocked Matsuzaka’s fastball in the upper 80s and he hit 90 mph once. Following his shutout appearance, Matsuzaka’s spring ERA is now down to 2.57. With the fifth spot in the Indians rotation up for grabs, Matsuzaka joins Corey Kluber, Carlos Carrasco, Scott Kazmir and Trevor Bauer in competition for the job.

Quick Game Facts:

•Outfielder Tyler Naquin, whom the Indians selected in the first round of last year’s draft, made his first appearance with the big league squad Tuesday and grounded out in his only at-bat.
•Catcher Roberto Perez’s go-ahead home run in the ninth inning was his first at the major league level.
•Left-hander David Huff pitched three solid innings on Tuesday, but surrendered a solo home run to left-handed hitter Brandon Belt. Even as a lefty, southpaws have hit .316 against Huff in his career.
•The Indians hit three home runs against the Giants bringing their total to six over their last two games. They have 19 homers so far this spring, second only to the Seattle Mariners (24) among MLB teams in 2013 exhibition play.
Wednesday: Indians vs. Dodgers @ Goodyear Ballpark

Justin Masterson will take the hill in Goodyear after recently being named the Indians’ opening day starter by manager Terry Francona. Masterson is 1-0 in Cactus League play this season with a 7.71 ERA in two appearances and hopes to rebound after getting roughed up for four runs against the White Sox last week. Cleveland will also send southpaws Rich Hill, Nick Hagadone and Scott Barnes to the mound. First pitch is at 3:05 ET.

Swisher is having a very good spring so far along with Lonnie. Man if Lonnie can go .260 with 20 and 80 this year that would be huge for this ballclub IMO.

Dice K with a nice outing but his velocity is atrocious. Right now if Kazmir keeps up his spring I believe that he and Zack McC will get the final two rotation spots due to the fact that Kluber, Carrasco and Bauer all have options. Plus Scott would be a nice Lefty addition to the rotation.

Juan Diaz doing a nice job filling in for ACab lately too. Man do they have a lot of SS prospects. Wouldn't be surprised to see them take calls on Diaz if he continues to have a nice spring.